Hawkeye Wife – What’s Up With the Watch?

It’s no secret that Hawkeye, aka Clint Barton, does quite well with the comic book ladies. He’s handsome, confident, has a criminal record and saved the world a few times — all the things that make him irresistible to the opposite sex. And, until recently, he also had a devoted wife.

But that all changed when his family was wiped out during the snap. Fortunately, he remarried in Avengers: Endgame and his new wife is as cool as she is supportive. But what’s the deal with her watch? All season, she has been asking him if he managed to secure the watch that was found in the ruins of the Avengers compound. The answer is yes, and it seems like it has some amount of value to both her and the bad guys who want to steal it.

Laura Barton is a perceptive lady, noticing that Natasha Romanoff was flirting with Bruce Banner before he did and acknowledging that her husband had some dark side to his violent vigilante persona. She also supported her husband’s quest to forgive himself for his actions as Ronin and mourned his loss when he was killed by Mephisto years later in the event story Secret Invasion. So, it’s no wonder that when she disappeared during the snap, many fans worried that she would never return.

She did return – but in a different form. Linda Cardellini, who appeared in everything from the 90s classic Freaks and Geeks to the Scooby-Doo movies and Netflix’s Dead Like Me, was brought back for her role as Laura Barton, Hawkeye’s widow. She also returned in the opening and closing scenes of Avengers: Endgame.

While she did have some great lines, it was a bit of a stretch to make her seem so detached from her husband’s world. Her lack of emotion during her scene with Barton in the crypt and the fact that she didn’t care that her phone was charging out of the blue, made it hard to believe that she actually existed.

That’s not to say that her presence wasn’t appreciated – but it was a little strange. The actress had already appeared in the MCU in the Agents of SHIELD TV show as Bobbi Morse, who is also known as Mockingbird. However, it’s unclear how much of her Agents of SHIELD story should be considered MCU canon at this point.

Instead, the bulk of the show’s attention was given to Kate Bishop (Hailee Steinfeld). She’s a scrappy college student who models herself on Hawkeye and is a proficient archer and fighter with a reckless juvenile streak. It’s that streak that gets her into trouble with a New York gang known as the Tracksuit Mafia, causing Renner’s jaded Avenger to take her under his wing. Despite her breeziness, she doesn’t fit in with the snobby socialites and sketchy dudes of Manhattan’s criminal underworld. And, as a result, her relationship with Barton feels forced rather than organic.